Fourth Sunday of Lent
Joshua 5:9-12
2 Corinthians 5:16-21
Luke 15:1-3, 11b-32
Psalm 32
Luke 15:11b-32 is perhaps one of the best-known parables of Jesus. It’s main point, perhaps its one point is the extravagant, generous, forgiving love of God. The parable is about a selfish spendthrift younger brother and a dutiful passive-aggressive older brother and their Father. It takes place in the context of a wealthy Jewish household amidst the religious and social milieu of the first century as a response to the grumbling of the Pharisees and the scribes (verse 2)
Depending on our emphasis we can call it ‘The parable of … the loving (or forgiving father), … the lost son, … the two brothers, … the lost sons’ etc.
Reread the parable taking particular note of what is said about workers and those who employ them.
After the money had run out the younger brother ‘hired himself out’ to a non-Jewish, Gentile farmer in a ‘distant country’. (v 15) This hiring arrangement seems hardly fair, when the son is so hungry, he envies the pigs’ dinner. (v 16) Better off to be a ‘hired hand’ back home where they ‘have bread enough and to spare’ (v 17). Those well off workers are later described as ‘slaves’ (v 22). The hired hands or slaves in the father’s house have enough and to spare (v 17) That is the perception of the younger son who is starving. Taking the image of the enterprise as being the household of God we can deduce that God wants his workers to be well looked after, with sufficient and to spare.
By contrast, in the far country, this young Jewish man has made himself into a non-citizen. There were several occupations which were prohibited to Jewish people. Among these were some of the people Jesus mixed with: prostitutes and tax collectors. Even the shepherds in the birth story would be included. Keeping or feeding pigs was an occupation certain to render a person ‘unclean’ and make them a non-citizen.
The older son saw himself as a slave (v 29), rather than the inheritor of a great estate, although somewhat diminished now that the younger son had wasted his share.
The waiting, running, forgiving, extravagant, ‘not listening to excuses’, Father shows he unconditionally accepts this son who has become a non-person by his actions. The treatment of the younger son is symbolic of treatment everyone can receive.
All people are loved in this way. We are all, the Gentile in the ‘distant county’, the prostitutes, tax collectors and non-Jewish sinners, the Pharisees and scribes, all people on earth are equally offered the forgiving love by this apparently bizarre Father.
And in this Father’s household no one is a slave as the older brother saw himself, all have enough and to spare as the younger brother perceived the ‘hired workers’ back home.
Reflection
If this is the way God treats each of us, ought we not treat all the people who serve us, such as the workers who produce our goods, with the same attitude of love?
Prayer
Loving, extravagant, generous God,
We thank you for your forgiveness as you welcome us into your Household.
Help us to see people as you see them, with watchful love and forgiveness.
Help us to treat people with dignity as we seek to remunerate all workers, so they have enough and to spare.
Amen
